Major U.S. companies from the cryptocurrency sector spent more than $4.6 million on lobbying for industry interests in 2021.
A report on the scale of lobbying for crypto projects in the US was presented by Crypto Head. The document compiles statistics from 2017. The data on lobbying is based on the results of the Open Secrets research group.
Over the past five years, more than $9.5 million has been spent by crypto companies to lobby their interests, with more than $4.6 spent in 2021. Analysts predict that lobbying expenditures could exceed $15 million in 2022. By comparison, the total amount spent in 2017 was about $200.000.
Robinhood, Ripple Labs and Coinbase were the biggest lobbyists in 2021. Three of them spent more than $3 million to promote their interests. Since 2017, it was almost the same companies that spent the most in this context:
- Ripple Labs — $1.95 million;
- Robinhood — $1.625 million;
- Blockchain Association — $1.465 million.
The list of other major lobbyists includes Block.one, Bitcoin Association, Algorand, Marqeta and others. However, analysts note that the statistics do not include the costs of political initiatives, that is, financial support of political forces during elections, particularly the presidential elections in 2020. To understand the extent of such support: according to Americans for Financial Reform, Wall Street’s financial community spent about $3 billion sponsoring election campaigns.
